Author: Techman

What you need to know about the next generation of broadband technology. ...

More than two-thirds of jobs that today's college students will have in 11 years haven't been invented yet. “Those who plan to work for the next 50 years, they have to have a mindset of like, ‘I’m going to be working and learning and working and learning, and working and learning,' in order to make a career,” says Rachel Maguire, a research director with the Institute for the Future, which forecasts that many of the tasks and duties of the jobs that today's young people will hold in 2030 don't exist right now. The Institute for the Future, a nonprofit that identities emerging trends and their impacts on global society, envisions that by 2030, we'll be living in a world where artificial assistants help us with almost every task, not…

There is no real preparation for dealing with the reality of being in a combat zone. But training helps, and that's the idea behind a virtual reality exercise that the International Committee of the Red Cross is providing to field employees. VOA's Kevin Enochs reports. ...

Apple Inc. on Thursday rolled out software updates to iPhones to fix a privacy issue in its FaceTime video calling service, and said it would contribute toward the education of the Arizona teenager who discovered the problem.  The software bug, which had let users hear audio from people who had not yet answered a video call, was discovered by a Tucson, Ariz., high school student Grant Thompson, who with his mother, Michele, led Apple to turn off FaceTime group chat as its engineers investigated the issue. The technology giant said it would compensate the Thompson family and make an additional gift toward 14-year-old Grant's education. Apple also formally credited Thompson and Daven Morris from Arlington, Texas in the release notes to its latest iPhone software update. "In addition to addressing the bug that was reported, our team conducted a thorough security audit of…

Apple Inc has moved its modem chip engineering effort into its in-house hardware technology group from its supply chain unit, two people familiar with the move told Reuters, a sign the tech company is looking to develop a key component of its iPhones after years of buying it from outside suppliers. Modems are an indispensable part of phones and other mobile devices, connecting them to wireless data networks. Apple once used Qualcomm Inc chips exclusively but began phasing in Intel Corp chips in 2016 and dropped Qualcomm from iPhones released last year. Johny Srouji, Apple’s senior vice president of hardware technologies, took over the company’s modem design efforts in January, the sources said. The organizational move has not been previously reported. Srouji joined Apple in 2008 to lead chip design,…

Facebook has been ordered to curb its data collection practices in Germany after a landmark ruling on Thursday that the world's largest social network abused its market dominance to gather information about users without their consent. Germany, where privacy concerns run deep, is in the forefront of a global backlash against Facebook, fueled by last year's Cambridge Analytica scandal in which tens of millions of Facebook profiles were harvested without their users' consent. The country's antitrust watchdog objected in particular to how Facebook pools data on people from third-party apps — including its own WhatsApp and Instagram — and its online tracking of people who aren't even members through Facebook 'like' or 'share' buttons. "In future, Facebook will no longer be allowed to force its users to agree to the…

Californians are bracing for what could be the next big earthquake. Scientists have developed a new early warning system relying on sensors and an algorithm to help prepare. Deana Mitchell reports. ...

Californians are bracing for what could be the next big earthquake. Scientists have developed a new early warning system relying on sensors and an algorithm to help prepare. Deana Mitchell reports. ...

Facebook, trudging through its awkward teenage years, is turning 15 on Monday.   Launched in 2004 as "TheFacebook," the service was originally intended only for Harvard students. It's now a massive global business that connects some 2.3 billion users. It was born in an era of desktop computers, years before the iPhone, and ran no ads.   At the time it was impossible to imagine that someday countries like Russia and Iran would try to use it for sophisticated information operations in order to influence elections around the world. In 2004, CEO Mark Zuckerberg's biggest problem may have been almost getting kicked out of Harvard. Zuckerberg's 2019 worries include the threat of government regulation of the empire he has built and the gnawing possibility that despite its stated lofty goals…

Pushpa Ithal may not fit the stereotype of the typical Silicon Valley CEO — she's female, foreign-born, and a mother. Nevertheless, Ithal is an entrepreneur, living the Silicon Valley dream of running her own startup. Like her, many foreign-born tech women are finding a place in the Valley — as tech companies have become more and more dependent on foreign-born workers to create their products and services. Silicon Valley, the global center for high-tech innovation, could be renamed "Immigrant Valley." When it comes to technical talent, the engine of Silicon Valley is fueled by foreign-born workers, many of whom are from humble roots. And having worked hard to get here, many have ambitions beyond their day jobs. One of them is Ithal. On Sundays, she and her two children, ages…

“She had so much to offer." Ian Russell is speaking of his 14-year-old daughter Molly, the youngest of three sisters, who committed suicide in 2017, leaving a note that read, “I am sorry. I did this because of me.” After Molly’s suicide, her parents examined the teenager’s social media use and discovered she was interacting with other teenage users caught in the grip of depression and who were suicidal and self-harming. The users were almost grooming themselves and goading each other to take drastic action. “I have no doubt that Instagram helped kill my daughter,” Molly’s father told the BBC in an explosive interview that drew a public apology from U.S. social media giant Facebook, owner of the photo sharing site Instagram, as well as a promise to do more…

Owners of a new café in the Hungarian capital Budapest are using robotics as a way of giving their customers a new experience. VOA’s Mariama Diallo reports. ...

In December 2018, Apple announced its plans to build a new campus in Austin. Texas is rapidly becoming more and more attractive for tech companies and is often called a second Silicon Valley, thanks to affordable housing, highly qualified workers and the abundance of universities that train IT professionals. Mariia Prus traveled to Dallas to see how universities help their students become entrepreneurs. Joy Wagner has her report. ...

Researchers and doctors are using incredibly tiny particles — fluorescent nanoparticles — in a quest for new ways to fight cancer. Some nanoparticles, just billionths of a meter across, are engineered to carry special dye that glows when it hits cancer cells. Oregon State University scientists say this makes it easier for surgeons to find and remove tumors. Iryna Matviichuk visited Portland and learned the new procedure is closer to testing in human patients. Anna Rice narrates her report. ...

The trade dispute between the U.S. and China is disrupting Silicon Valley. What had been a steady flow of Chinese money into tech firms appears to be slowing. Investors are concerned about the “headline risk” of doing business with Chinese investors. And in some cases, U.S. startups are shunning Chinese investment. These changes come after years of investment and collaboration between China and Silicon Valley. But the trade dispute, coupled with U.S. policymakers’ concerns about Chinese investments in sensitive technologies, such as artificial intelligence, have increased scrutiny of cross border deals on all sides. A drop in investment In 2018, Chinese firms invested more than $2 billion in U.S. technology firms, but that was a drop of nearly 80 percent from the year before, according to a Forbes report citing…

Tech companies and nearly two dozen U.S. states clashed with the government in federal court Friday over the repeal of net neutrality, a set of Obama-era rules aimed at preventing big internet providers from discriminating against certain technology and services.    Judges challenged arguments made by both sides in the face-off in an appeals court in Washington.      Lawyers for the states and the companies tried to persuade the three-judge panel to restore the net neutrality regime, set in 2015 but repealed in December 2017 at the direction of a regulator appointed by President Donald Trump. The companies challenging the FCC action include Mozilla, developer of the Firefox web browser, and Vimeo, a video-sharing site.    The net neutrality rules had banned cable, wireless and other broadband providers from blocking…

A United Arab Emirates senior diplomat denied Thursday the country had targeted "friendly countries" or American citizens in a cyberspying program that a Reuters report said involved a hacking team of U.S. mercenaries. The Reuters investigation published Wednesday found that the UAE used a group of American intelligence contractors to help hack rival governments, dissidents and human rights activists. The contractors, former U.S. intelligence operatives, formed a core part of UAE's cyber hacking program called Project Raven. Project Raven also targeted Americans, and the Apple Inc iPhones of embassy staff for France, Australia and the United Kingdom, according to former operatives and program documents reviewed by Reuters. Apple has declined to comment and did not immediately respond to a request for comment Thursday. When asked about Project Raven by reporters…

Facebook said Thursday it took down hundreds of "inauthentic" accounts from Iran that were part of a vast manipulation campaign operating in more than 20 countries. The world's biggest social network said it removed 783 pages, groups and accounts "for engaging in coordinated inauthentic behavior tied to Iran." The pages were part of a campaign to promote Iranian interests in various countries by creating fake identities as residents of those nations, according to a statement by Nathaniel Gleicher, head of cybersecurity policy at Facebook. The announcement was the latest by Facebook as it seeks to stamp out efforts by state actors and others to manipulate the social network using fraudulent accounts. "We are constantly working to detect and stop this type of activity because we don't want our services to…

Apple says Facebook can no longer distribute an app that paid users, including teenagers, to extensively track their phone and web use. In doing so, Apple closed off Facebook's efforts to sidestep Apple's app store and its tighter rules on privacy. The tech blog TechCrunch reported late Tuesday that Facebook paid people about $20 a month to install and use the Facebook Research app. While Facebook says this was done with permission, the company has a history of defining “permission” loosely and obscuring what data it collects. “I don't think they make it very clear to users precisely what level of access they were granting when they gave permission,” mobile app security researcher Will Strafach said Wednesday. “There is simply no way the users understood this.” He said Facebook's claim…

Whether it’s haggling for a better price or negotiating for a higher salary, there is a skill to getting the most of what you want. Researchers at the University of Southern California Institute for Creative Technologies are conducting research on how a virtual negotiator may be able to teach you the art of making a good deal. VOA’s Elizabeth Lee has the details. ...

Apple hoped to offset slowing demand for iPhones by raising the prices of its most important product, but that strategy seems to have backfired after sales sagged during the holiday shopping season. Results released Tuesday revealed the magnitude of the iPhone slump - a 15 percent drop in revenue from the previous year. That decline in Apple's most profitable product caused Apple's total earnings for the October-December quarter to dip slightly to $20 billion. Now, CEO Tim Cook is grappling with his toughest challenge since replacing co-founder Steve Jobs 7 years ago. Even as he tries to boost iPhone sales, Cook also must prove that Apple can still thrive even if demand doesn't rebound.  It figures to be an uphill battle, given Apple's stock has lost one-third of its value…

If Twitter is the town square for journalists, some are ready to step away. That's happening this week at the online news site Insider — by order of the boss. Reporters have been told to take a week off from tweeting at work and to keep TweetDeck off their computer screens. The idea of disengaging is to kick away a crutch for the journalists and escape from the echo chamber, said Julie Zeveloff West, Insider's editor-in-chief for the U.S. Addiction to always-rolling Twitter feeds and the temptation to join in has led to soul-searching in newsrooms. Some of it is inspired by the reaction to the Jan. 19 demonstration in Washington involving students from a Covington, Kentucky, high school, which gained traction as a story primarily because of social media…

Senior U.S. officials and experts say the United States needs to rally allies to pressure China stealing advanced technology through cyber espionage. At the same time, key American lawmakers are questioning the readiness and capacity of the U.S. to counter such threats. The renewed push comes after U.S. federal prosecutors pressed criminal charges against the world's largest telecommunications company — China's Huawei Technologies — its chief financial officer and several subsidiaries for alleged financial fraud and theft of U.S. intellectual property. Huawei denies the charges. Beijing denies its government and military engage in cyber-espionage, saying the U.S. allegations are fabricated. "The Huawei incident seems like an action against an individual corporation, but it is actually bigger than this," said Hu Xingdou, a Beijing-based scholar. "This is about one state's technology…

Apple has made the group chat function in FaceTime unavailable after users said there was a bug that could allow callers to activate another user's microphone remotely.   The bug was demonstrated through videos online and reported on this week by tech blogs. Reports said the bug in the video chat app could allow an iPhone user calling another iPhone through Group Facetime to hear the audio from the other handset — even if the receiver did not accept the call.   "We're aware of this issue and we have identified a fix that will be released in a software update later this week," Apple said in a statement Tuesday.   Its online support page noted there was a technical issue with the application and that Group Facetime "is temporarily unavailable."…

From hackers exposing private information online to the handling of users' data by internet giants, online privacy has become a matter of growing concern for countries, companies and people alike. On Monday, countries around the world marked Data Privacy Day, also known as Data Protection Day — an initiative to raise awareness of internet safety issues. Here are 10 facts about online privacy: Less than 60 percent of countries have laws to secure the protection of data and privacy. Europe's data protection regulators have received more than 95,000 complaints about possible data breaches since the adoption of a landmark EU privacy law in May. More than one in two respondents to a 2018 global survey by pollster CIGI-Ipsos said they had grown more concerned about their online privacy compared to…

When Danny Reagan was 13, he began exhibiting signs of what doctors usually associate with drug addiction. He became agitated, secretive and withdrew from friends. He had quit baseball and Boy Scouts, and he stopped doing homework and showering. But he was not using drugs. He was hooked on YouTube and video games, to the point where he could do nothing else. As doctors would confirm, he was addicted to his electronics. "After I got my console, I kind of fell in love with it," Danny, now 16 and a junior in a Cincinnati high school, said. "I liked being able to kind of shut everything out and just relax.” Danny was different from typical plugged-in American teenagers. Psychiatrists say internet addiction, characterized by a loss of control over internet…

Iran is likely to expand its cyberespionage activities as its relations with Western powers worsen, the European Union digital security agency said Monday. Iranian hackers are behind several cyberattacks and online disinformation campaigns in recent years as the country tries to strengthen its clout in the Middle East and beyond, a Reuters Special Report published in November found. This month the European Union imposed its first sanctions on Iran since world powers agreed to a 2015 nuclear deal with Tehran, in a reaction to Iran's ballistic missile tests and assassination plots on European soil. "Newly imposed sanctions on Iran are likely to push the country to intensify state-sponsored cyber threat activities in pursuit of its geopolitical and strategic objectives at a regional level," the European Union Agency for Network and…

Blockchain technology – a high-tech way to securely manage and protect data – is best-known as the driver of the cryptocurrency Bitcoin. Now, a U.S. coffee importer is using it to improve the lives of coffee farmers and some of the poorest communities in Central America. Faith Lapidus reports. ...